


Mad Max Meta

by ThoughtfulFangirl



Category: MMFR, Mad Max Fury road
Genre: Essay, Gen, Meta
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-16
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-09-20 09:28:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17020119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThoughtfulFangirl/pseuds/ThoughtfulFangirl
Summary: Tumblr crosspost of meta





	1. Max's Violation: A Substitute for the Prisoner's Pain

The last time I went to see Mad Max Fury Road (Sunday), I went with my mom and her husband (and my partner, but that should generally be assumed lolol). My mom admitted after the movie that she’d been afraid she wouldn’t like it but had faith that she would enjoy something I did so much. But of course she loved it. 

What was interesting though, is that her husband, a man who loves action movies, didn’t seem so sure about it. Oh, he didn’t hate it, but he didn’t seem to find it spectacular either. He finally at one point said that he wasn’t sure he cared for how Max starts out the movie so weak—how he gets caught so quickly, so easily, and then is essentially useless for the first quarter of the movie. (See also this brilliant meta that addresses this very thing, though in a different way than I hope to.) I think he mentioned this in close proximity to me talking to my mom about how great it is that the movie is dealing with domestic/sexual violence, but we don’t actually see any sexual violence perpetrated against Immortan Joe’s prisoners—my Revolutionaries.

The juxtaposition of those thoughts made me realize that, on some level:

We experienced the violence and degradation of the Revolutionaries through Max.

Narratively, this is kind of obvious. It’s through Max that we get to see how awful the Citadel is, and we get to see why the Revolutionaries wouldn’t want to remain there. But it’s so much more nuanced than that.

When people think about rape, what do they imagine? Often a woman tied up and being penetrated, hurt. We may picture them fighting back a bit (and probably getting hurt for it), but ultimately there’s nothing they can do. They get reduced to their body, and their body gets used up. In a very real sense, rape victims feel branded for life and often experience PTSD themselves.

What do we see happen to Max? He’s strung up, humiliated by the unceremonious cutting of all his hair (they did a really good job with the facial hair though, I might say). He gets silenced (gagged), and it’s implied he eventually gets branded. While he’s being held in chains, he’s being tattooed, a literal form of (mild) penetration. Later we know they stick needles in him, and his body is used for the purpose of life: to keep Nux alive and strong. This last act also parallels the very purpose of Immortan’s prisoners. Max is there to keep war boys alive: the women are there to bring war boys (though hopefully an heir apparently) into the world in the first place. Their bodies are used to sustain the physical bodies of others.

So Max undergoes a metaphorical rape in lieu of us ever seeing the women experience it. The place where depicting their rape could have narratively fit into the plot of this movie, we see the vulnerability of Max and the stripping of his agency instead.

This doesn’t mean that Max’s treatment should necessarily be compared and contrasted with the Revolutionaries’ experiences. They all had shitty lots under Immortan Joe’s rule, and that’s ultimately the point! One that I think the movie clearly handled well. Under joe’s tyranny, the bodies of the people around him are his commodities.

And it’s not something we see very often in media. Oh, sometimes we get torture scenes that star our male heroes, but they have a different flavor. They’re usually being questioned, or the villain is exacting their vengeance against our hero. They, as an individual, are vital to what is happening to them and is what propelled them to that place in their story. In contrast, the violence against Max has nothing to do with him as an individual, similarly to sexual violence. It’s about those in the Citadel using his body for their purposes—ultimately their domination over him and everyone else. In their society, he is replaceable in a way that other scenes in movies that depict the violation of men are not, and those depictions always further a man’s character arc and play on his importance. 

In other movies, violence against our male heros happens along the way; it happens as a result of his actions; it happens because he has engaged with the enemies, put himself in their path. And that’s so very… male. 

Max doesn’t engage the enemy, doesn’t get in their way. He just exists, and they chase him down. They take his vehicle though they’ve likely never seen him or it before. Max (and his car) simply exist and have entered Citadel territory; therefore, he and his things become Citadel property. The violence against Max is portrayed so much more the way we’re used to seeing violence against women, and it’s unnerving and unpleasant and probably made some men feel the affects and revulsion against that kind of violence in a way they never have before, because for once the face of that victim is male. For once, the character they’re supposed to imagine themselves as is getting attacked and violated without provocation, senselessly. 

And this wasn’t something that struck me as too out of the ordinary right away. I definitely realized it’s not something we see very often, but it narratively didn’t bother me, seem out of place, or even that strange—though clearly there was something unique in that it was our main, male protagonist. But then again, I am invested in my female characters in my media, and I’m honestly quite used to seeing this be part of a woman’s narrative. Being dominated over and overcoming that is a very common story arc that starts a strong female character’s story, but it’s not a common one for our male heroes. Male heroes experience pain and brutalization as a plot point on their way through the story, not as a starting point, not as something to run away from or exact vengeance for.

And if you didn’t check out the meta I link to at the top, you should, because it highlights just how unique and important it is that it happens to Max. It’s unique and bold storytelling. It lets men (Nux too) be vulnerable and emotional and lost and to find themselves along the way instead of simply knowing who they are and who they should be and just being that.

Maybe someday I’ll talk more about it, but Max and Nux have the most transformative character arcs in this movie. Furiosa as a character really doesn’t change too much. As fuckyeahisawthat exquisitely puts it:

—

“If the action is being driven by Furiosa’s choices, it’s worth asking why Max is there at all. And here is where Fury Road does us one better than just replacing a lone male hero with a lone female one.

Fury Road is a dual protagonist narrative. Max isn’t there just as a supporting character. But because Furiosa’s storyline does so much of the heavy lifting in terms of moving the plot along, Max is freed up to have a story that’s mostly about his feelings.”

—

And gosh, how refreshing is that?!

 

Edit: This meta was written while the movie was still in theaters. Now that I have seen it many, many additional times…. I do not stand by the comment that Furiosa doesn’t transform much.


	2. Furiosa and her War Boys

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cross posting meta from Tumblr. This was originally posted 6/7/15.

I just saw Mad Max Fury Road for the fourth time, and I’m always looking for new things, paying attention to different stuff. I wasn’t actually looking for this, but I was particularly struck this time at Furiosa’s initial defiance, which starts with her turning the war rig off its path to Gas Town. The music mimics the beat of a heart, which I took to depict anxiety (her own heart pounding or simply conveying to the audience that tension). There are several close ups of her face where she’s checking her surroundings—gauging her best move. I’ve always attributed this to that ‘point of no return’ anxiety, and I think in large part it is. Once you’ve done something, you have to go with it, and it affords a certain level of relief once done. That point just before you make that decision is often the most anxiety ridden—you can still turn around. So it’s no surprised that we’re seeing an anxious Furiosa moments before she turns the rig off the road.

What follows is even more interesting. Obviously she’d still be anxious, now from the prospect of anticipating the first blowback to her decision. And then Ace shows up and asks what’s going on. She’s quiet for a long moment, and he waits for her answer. Finally she says, “We’re heading east.” She doesn’t come up with some false explanation; in fact, she’s being completely honest. Ace is clearly still confused, but he accepts it and starts delivering orders to that effect.

Immortan’s troops send up their flares, calling for backup. Ace pounds on the top of the rig, getting Furiosa’s attention, and she slides the sunroof back so he can talk to her. He notifies her of the flares and asks what it means. Furiosa checks her rearview mirror and (again possibly not lying) says, “It’s a detour.” Ace takes her at her word even though this obviously doesn’t shed any more light into what’s going on. Furiosa’s being really freaking vague, but her team clearly trusts her. Ace is the only one to approach her, and he takes her at her word, without questioning her.

The Buzzards then come bearing down on them, and Ace asks at Furiosa’s window if they should turn around and run the buzzards into the backup. This seems very matter of fact to him. Why take them on, on their own, when they have backup? Sure, they could take them, but why bother? But Furiosa says they’ll “fang it,” and blares her horn—what I’m assuming is akin to her imperator war cry. Ace gets back up and starts issuing orders with this plan, and the first action sequence really gets going.

It was at some point, when one of the war boys falls off the rig, that the camera cut to her looking in her rearview mirror, and I noticed her eyes were watery (or at the very least is obviously moist). Having seen the movie three times before, this suddenly seemed weird. Furiosa is tough. She presents a tough exterior. The only other time we see her eyes watering is when she’s been seriously injured: stabbed in the side. This was also before the sandstorm (no inordinate amount of dust to get in the eyes), so I had the thought, ‘what is going on?’ For a movie that’s been explicitly said to have the intent to tell as much of the story without dialogue as possible, I couldn’t help but think this is telling us, as the audience, something important. That thought was followed shortly by another shot of her checking her rearview mirror and then a cut to more fighting. It finally occurred to me: those are her team members out there dying, and it had been her job to lead them. She’s probably been working with all of these men for some time now. This is her crew. She has a practiced maneuver with Ace, so at the very least it’s blatantly clear that she and Ace are used to working with each other. There’s a good chance she knows each and every one of those boys’ names.

And then there’s Ace, hanging off the side of her door, demanding answers. He’s finally accepted that something is wrong, something is off; Furiosa is defecting. There had been evidence before, but he had chosen not to see it; he had turned a blind eye. Now Nux is driving nearby, pointing a gun at him, yelling at him to get out of the way so he can shoot Furiosa, but Ace remains there, between Furiosa and a bullet, demanding answers, and Furiosa is ignoring him. She’s doesn’t react at all to him visually up until he grabs her throat. She hardly looked at him at all during their sequences, and when she does, it’s fleeting. But she does look, does observe, when the war boys are fighting, from a safe distance from being observed doing it. The visual/body language seems to suggest to me that on some level, she can’t help but feel bad about betraying this team of hers, feels shame whenever confronted by Ace. As much as she knows she’s doing a redemptive thing, it’s hard and hurts her.

Also notable is the fact that Furiosa doesn’t raise a weapon to him. Oh she gets tough and aggressive when he strangles her, but she doesn’t grab out any of the myriad weapons we know she has around her and just punches him off the rig. She could have killed him. She’s ready to kill Anyone else that threatens her cause in the movie—even Max and Nux—but even without anyone there to stop her, she does not attempt to kill Ace.

I’m definitely of the belief now that Furiosa did feel some kinship with her crew, and that perhaps the most difficult part, emotionally, up until she returned to the Vuvalini, was turning her back on them. I’m sure it must have been hard not to be able to tell them her intentions. I mean, it’s clear she could not have—they would have stopped her, but this also means she never even got the chance to ask them to come along, to help, to join her. Maybe Ace would have if he’d had the time? She couldn’t afford to find out.

It also adds that much motivation that her mission succeeds. She turned her back on those men who died in her battle for her to get redemption, so it’s all that more imperative that she follows through. When Max gives her the choice to leave Immortant’s prisoners behind, she could have gotten in that rig and ridden off to the green place. If it were vengeance she needed, she could have turned a gun on the women so that Joe could never have them again. Sure, either way he’s pissed, but after the canyon wall was going to be blown, they probably weren’t going to make all that much more of an effort (definitely not the People Eater). Instead, she talks Max into letting them all back in the rig.

It’s definitely something I wouldn’t have noticed during a first, maybe even second, watch through, as it doesn’t seem off to seeing the cuts to Furiosa looking around all the time, intently watching what is behind her instead of in front of her, her eyes watering, and her gaze constantly averted away from those who are obviously going to be her enemies. But these are all things we don’t see much of later. Instead, she looks before her to the Green Place(s), glares down her enemies, and maintains her composure whenever she’s behind the wheel (sans injury). Knowing her better, it’s clearer that something else is going on beneath the surface, and given how much of the story was intended to be done visually, I definitely think this was intentional.

And it’s stuff like this that makes the movie so wonderful. We have Nux to humanize the war boys, but I think this humanizes them as well, more as a whole. Ace is compelling. You feel for him and his misguided faith in Furiosa. You understand his hurt when he realizes what is going on. They may not have had time to depict that with Furiosa’s other crewmembers, but I think her often looking behind her as they fought is their nod to the fact that she was their leader and, on some level, did care for them. They are human, but their serving her oppressor left her little choice in her mission for redemption.

I love this movie so much, and Furiosa has stolen my heart.


	3. Thought on War Boys and Internalized Oppression

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was originally posted on 08/09/15

Almost any way you interpret Mad Max Fury Road, it’s an over-the-top, over dramatized, bigger-than-life depiction. I see the sisters as a depiction of women fleeing domestic and sexual abuse, and it’s portrayed as it’s most extreme form: sexual slavery. The show depicts the greed of our generation in not preserving the planet’s resources (global warming) in the souring and depletion of almost all viable water sources in the known wasteland and culminating in a post apocalyptic, tyrannical narrative. Immortan Joe is the physical manifestation of patriarchy and particularly those who, on a more conscious level, embrace it to further their own ambitions. 

The War Boys? The War Boys represent us. Oh, so do the Wretched and Furiosa and Max and even the Vuvalini in their own ways. But the War Boys reflect the parts of ourselves that isn’t done flushing out the toxic forms of oppression and micro aggressions from our very own minds. And we’re all raised with them, because we’re all raised in a society that teaches sexism/racism/colorism/heteronormativity/classism/etc. They, in many ways, are more than just our child-like selves, they’re our naive, ignorant, problematic selves. 

Nux’s tale is a tale of hope and overcoming these. It’s a tale that says the most ignorant of us have the capacity to learn if we just take it. 

Slit is the part of that fights any reprogramming others (Nux) have to teach themselves to become better members of society. Slit is the part of us that fights to hold onto the self we were groomed to be—in some ways the easiest self. The self that still wants to be ‘mainstream cool’ and ‘edgy’ and not disappoint those in power so we can be successful in life and never feel bad about it. 

Each War Boy represents a sort of broken base at which we can rise from and become a revolutionary, learn from the Vuvalini and the sisters, embrace those parts of their ways that proves better than what you’ve known before. 

The War Boys provide an outlet with no consequences, because they’re already the worst of the worst without being malicious about it. They are ignorantly evil. They can be redeemable. Does that mean that there can’t be maliciousness among them? No. Slit proves that (”Mediocre!”). 

They offer a childlike outlet that still has depth and complexity which allows for a potentially larger range of character experiences and development. You can’t fuck up with the war boys because they’re already fucked up. 

Also, it’s worth noting that it’s clear that there are many, many faceless war boys that we actually see on screen. Ones that are given no personality, no background, no particular role outside maybe a couple seconds of screen time. They are the perfect fodder for OCs. (Also, might I just suggest that maybe there could be other female war boys; they’re clearly just super rare. What about transgender war boys? Either mtf or ftm. How would mtf work in Citadel society? Esp if that War Boy isn’t interested in changing lots? Just random thoughts as I’m typing)

Like, personally, I am way more about the Vuvalini and the sisters and Furiosa, but for a movie that’s doing all sorts of commentary on problematic shit in our society (and doing it largely quite well that fans might not want to go ahead and fuck up), the War Boys present a very appealing canvass on which to paint, literally or metaphorically…with words. 

Just saying


	4. The Green Place & The Vuvalini

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted 07/30/15

Okay, so this isn’t going to be great or well structured as I’m really breaking the rules to do this, but I can’t get it off my mind and might not sleep if I don’t write something about it. 

I’ve been thinking about the Vuvalini for some times. I see the assumption often that the Green Place had only women. This was never my assumption. It didn’t occur to me that they would have a structure like that given what’s presented. I did assume their society was a matriarch, but this does not require a society composed only of women. 

Knowing this, I’ve been thinking about how we do only meet female Vuvalini, and slowly a theory has been forming. 

And then we got word about how when the water went sour, the Vuvalini apparently abandoned their male children to the crows, and that’s who we see on the stilts. 

And this bothered me. A lot. It still does. Mostly because, without any context, it kind of retcons the characters we met. No way mothers left male children behind but took Furiosa’s word that strange men who came from Citadel are ‘reliable’ and have that be that. 

No fucking way. 

Sorry. I just do. not. buy. it. 

Because let’s face it, if Furiosa was stolen as a child, either Citadel or people in alliance with Citadel were raiding the Green Place long ago and would be what made the Vuvalini wary of men in the first place. 

There’s some good conversation about it here and reading it was what made me put on my brace, pull out the laptop, and start writing. One, because I think Schwarmerei might be right in that there’s a good chance this was an idea at some point but was never settled on, but two, because this idea, if worded different, kind of works with the theory I’ve been forming. 

Which is that the men from the Green Place had more viable alternatives to where they relocated when the water went sour. They were also safer staying in the Green Place. The Citadel sucks for everyone, but it’s less bad for men. And if all the men and their children were as healthy as Furiosa, things would look up for them at the Citadel—as far as looking up goes in those places. The men could take their male children and go to Citadel, Bullet Farm, Gas Town. 

Because let’s face it, if the women left the male children behind, there were still fathers who had some responsibility for those male children too. While the society was matriarchal, I’m sure fathers weren’t left completely out of their children’s lives. It takes two to make a kid. Both the men and women would be responsible for what happened to their children, even if more of that weight is on their leaders’ shoulders.

As far as the crow people… sour water means weakness. Given that the Green Place was obviously raided sometimes for its girls, this would make defending their female children implausible, forcing the women to move on, away from the bog and away from the west. There is less need to hide and fight back for the men who stayed behind as, while raiders might take some men to be war boys or donors, it’s simply less worth it without the potential brides to steal. I’ve kind of assumed that since there was less incentive to run away from the Green Place when it went bad, they simply didn’t. There’s still water and food. More food in some respects then we see anywhere else than in Citadel. 

It does seem strange that they’d leave their women to find their way on their own so completely, but maybe some didn’t and just didn’t survive for us to see them. They seemed to have more bikes than they did Vuvalini, which may suggest that their numbers have been slowly dwindling over the years anyway. 

So like, this discussion is good and is important, and I definitely hope we get more explanation. Because I’m also very much with Kimbureh when they say:

"usually those explanations read like some man thought em up, a man who can imagine only women hating on man as much as he hates on women. I’m thinking particularly about the Amazon myth which is used in the Enlightenment to put male cruelty into perspective, claiming if women were to rule the world they would be much crueler - lucky times men are in charge, eh.  
I don’t like this new background information, but considering the skill Miller has shown so far I have a liiiittle bit of hope he manages to humanize the Vuvalini and depicting them neither as flawless godesses nor as raging beasts."

Because no, it’s not likely their civilization was perfect, but what’s presented, as it was, goes beyond merely ‘imperfect society.’ I never actually expected the Green Place to be some utopia, because it’s still in the wasteland! (And Furiosa has clearly built it up like her own Valhalla over the years.) Even without knowing it was soured, we know it got raided. Furiosa was stolen. Plagued societies are damaged and hurt societies. And maybe a society like that would grow hard and bitter towards men to the point that they internalized the idea that all men are evil. But if it got so ingrained that they just left the children behind, Max and Nux would have been shot on sight. 

Edit: Ug, last edit for grammar resulted in a whole section disappearing. Luckily I’d copied the whole thing. WTF tumblr?!


	5. Milk Mothers' Revolution and Fatness in Mad Max

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted 05/19/15

I thought it was a beautiful touch that the women who were essentially being perpetual wet nurses and providing Immortan Joe with milk were the ones at the end to turn the water on. These women who were literally slaves of production—having to constantly let flow from their bosom nourishment to their oppressors—were given the agency at the end to get up and let their milk run dry by choosing to let the water flow. 

Edit: There’s no way Furiosa indicated to those women to let the water flow. There’s no visual cues, and the lift is quite far from that spot. Those women chose, on their own, to start the water running, and that’s important! 

This is what makes such great media. These small touches that go out of their way to show people pushing back, even if they can’t have full scenes dedicated to them. 

Now using fatness be what cues us into the fact that they’re perpetual milk donators is a little sad and sketchy. I can see their thought process—it’s likely that only Imortan Joe, his “wives,” and the wet nurses are ever truly well fed—it is problematic that only the villains or people not given much screen time were fat. At that point in their society, fat would likely have reached a point of being seen as more attractive as the well-to-do have the highest chance of reaching healthy body weight, so you’d almost expect at least some of the “wives” to be fat as well, and really, most of them probably should have been. At least chubby.


	6. Who Killed the World

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Many people pointed out after the fact that this meta didn't contain much *new* information that the fandom hadn't already talked about. I hadn't meant to present it as though it was but had wanted to condense the conversation down into one piece that lays it out. Unfortunately, the conversation was so prevalent, I couldn't have said who first posited what in relation to these ideas in those discussions. Not very academic of me. 
> 
> This was also an image heavy piece and might not make the most sense without them but I'm trying to move things quick. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ Sorry 
> 
> Originally posted to Tumblr 01/14/16

While the answer to ‘Who Killed the World’ isn’t arguably the central theme to Mad Max Fury Road, we couldn’t have this movie without those ‘who killed the world.’ The fact that several times throughout the movie this question is posed is important. This question only gets noticeably asked throughout the movie, but it is done in such a way that we, as the audience, should easily be able to infer the answer to. 

The screen shots above, with Immortan Joe in the vault with that very question sprayed on the walls above his head, visually gives us the answer. Angharad also provides the answer when she rhetorically asks Nux ‘Then who killed the world?!’ when they’re speaking about Immortan Joe. 

 

Who killed the World? People like Joe did. People like The Bullet Farmer (BF) and The People Eater (PE). A conversation the other day made me realize how eloquently the movie demonstrated this. 

From the movie alone, it’s hard to know if Joe believes his lies or not or the extent to which he does. In the end, it kind of doesn’t matter. It doesn’t seem unreasonable, however, to say that on some level, he thinks that what he is doing is for the best of mankind and that evils he perpetuate are necessary evils. Of course, its clear though that while he may believe in what he’s doing, it is grandstanding. It all feeds his vanity. He sees other people as property and has branded them his own, belying his narcism. (I couldn’t possible imagine a person vying for world power today demonstrating such traits…¬.¬)

Joe is deluded by his own importance, which means ultimately, he places himself and his needs above those he believes he’s creating a better life for. We see this a lot in his grandstanding. He takes more than in necessary to cultivate his image. The most notable moment his when he gives to the wretched. It’s supposed to look like a gracious gesture. He warns them first not to be addicted to water; clearly this is just rhetoric to try and control the narrative around water: I am not a villain for withholding water; you are all gluttons for desiring this. This allows him the power to look like a giving god while he’s really withholding. And he enhances this image of being a giver in the manner in which he releases the water. It looks like bountiful amounts of water, but as is painfully obvious, it is a wasteful means that hardly benefits any of those it’s designed to appear he is benefitting. (This post that talks about Capitalism and the trend of ‘buy one give one to the needy’ is poignant here.)

This behavior is only magnified when he perceives something to be stolen from him. Because if we pretend for one moment that his dictatorship is somehow aiding humanity, the actions that follow his realization that the revolutionaries have been “stolen” prove that his sense of entitlement is more important than that of the ‘kingdom’ he has built. 

He takes in pursuit of one War Rig and five “breeders” the entire defense of Citadel, the one place holding clean water for seemingly miles and miles around. Imagine too how many resources they would have to take with them to supplement that army. They must have ravaged their own food stocks. They took along with them the only healer we’ve seen along with probably all of those who were able-bodied and able to perform rigorous chores and daily tasks.

On top of all of this, he calls down those same resources for the two other domains that help make up the ecosystem for Citadel. Once you realize this is all done to retain five women who were his ‘prized breeders’ (implying they were not the only breeders) above all else (such as the War Rig itself and the produce aboard). 

The initial pursuit doesn’t seem unreasonable. The War Rig hasn’t gotten far; if they take it down quickly, they could return quickly to further keep the gears turning at Citadel. But as the losses begin to stack up in crashed vehicles, used up gas, and the very lives of their people, there is no seeming thought on Joe’s mind of turning back. 

The point at which their path is obstructed by the debris of the Rock Raider’s explosion seems like where a reasonable leader would turn around and count his losses, but Joe pushes forward. He pursues that which he believes he deserves with a single vehicle, implying that he believed that this amount of force should have been enough; otherwise, he wouldn’t have put himself in such a position. This only further demonstrates that the entire war party he brought was an elaborate show of force, something to feed his vanity. There is a good chance too that, without Angharad, Team War Rig wouldn’t have made it much farther than that moment. Angharad, Joe’s most prized possession for what she carries, stops him from getting a shot off on Furiosa. 

The more interesting part of this interaction, however, is the moment she falls from the War Rig. It is understandable that Joe wanted to avoid running her over, but it’s interesting to note what he chooses to do. 

There’s no way Joe could have known, but I think it’s interesting that Angharad falls in a position that is fairly clearly between the wheel of Joe’s vehicle. I’m not saying Joe in any way intentionally ran Angharad over when he wrenched the wheel to the side, but I think it’s interesting that this is how the creators decided for it play out.

What I do think is of note is the fact that it doesn’t seem to even occur to him to slam on the brakes. Afterall, his son and imperators are on the outside of that vehicle, simply kept on by what grips they have on the outside of the vehicle. The choice he makes in that split second is about as destructive it can be while in the act of trying to save something he cares about. Even if the moment Angharad slipped until the moment he makes that choice was too short to brake, it is interesting that he clearly saw she was in danger earlier, hanging off the side of the rig, and it doesn’t occur to him to slow. His need to reclaim/save what he feels he’s entitled to is more important than those who helps him along the way or that very thing itself, and in the end, he probably ended up doing the most damage to what he claims to love. 

This is a behavior Joe perpetuates multiple times throughout the film, putting his people and what he’s created at risk in his pursuit of what he feels entitled to. All the water, bullets, followers, and vehicles are not enough for him; he must have these other things too. 

And no one calls him out on this, not in any meaningful way. He’s created a culture that enables him. We don’t see Rictus ask why he would do such a thing—put him at such a risk. We don’t see his imperators imploring him to back down or make any different choices that would protect them or their people. And we get from PE and BF what? A little bitching here and there but no real attempts to bring Joe around. 

Joe is essentially a man who did something he felt was beneficial to society, who then felt that he was entitled to whatever he wished, surrounded himself with yes men, and was never satisfied with what he had afterward. He has two sons, and yet neither are good enough to be his heirs; would there ever be a child good enough? 

And this is the answer I believe is being stated over and over again, throughout the movie, to the question: who killed the world. It’s an extension of the world we live in. The wealthiest people in the world are white men who keep pushing for more more more, ignoring the costs their pursuits put on everything else: the environment, the poor, the disenfranchised, the individual (those who are not them). 

Joe is the brainwash that there is no other way to live, that any other way would be too idealistic and ruin what stability there is. He’s who blames the person born to poverty and illness for failing to have what they need to survive. He is the entitlement that those who provide something deserve everything. He’s the ‘nice guy’ who puts in the tiniest bit of effort into you, and now you owe it to him to give everything. He’s the one who sees the world to be had and not to be shared. Joe is the whim at which basic needs be denied if you dare to question. Joe is the illusion that to have power is to be powerful. 

The People Eater is the corporate greed, the one who knows just how much is had, how much could be given if the top would take less, the one who watches those resources slip away but does nothing but grumble about it. He is the cowardice which keeps one from speaking up when you know something isn’t right, the one that goes along until he is in front of a shot the man he follows wants to take and ends up with nothing anyway. He is the one paralyzed from action and movement except to follow due to a fear of possibly having less. 

The Bullet Farmer is the action man. He is the malice with which power like Joe’s needs to enforce his regime. He is the hand that will gleefully coerce and intimidate others because he likes that feeling of power and the rush it gives him. He is the one so necessary, the one who was placed in power in part because of his relationship with the powers that be, that rules don’t apply to him. He is the one that can waste resources and life because something bad happened to him. The world deserves to have a rain of bullets fall down because something unjust happened to him, no matter the cost. 

 

These are the men Team War Rig are up against in order to find a better life. It’s only fitting that on Team War Rig, there is room to improve, room to make mistakes. It’s only fitting that resources are carefully distributed, labor equally shared to each indiviuals’ ability, and each individual valued. It’s fitting that when Furiosa needs to mourn, she takes a moment to herself, then gets back on her feet rather than putting the team in jeopardy with her grief, neither paralyzed nor taking irrational actions. It’s important that when Max doesn’t share a destination, a goal, it does not mean he’s robbed of all resources. It matters that the biggest decision Team War Rig faces is worked out together, as a group, with all the information laid out and no delusions, and a decision which is being made at all because someone said, “No, that’s not the right way. We can do more. We can do better.” 

Because these are the traits we need to save the world.


End file.
